Time will Tell
by Bro-inski
Summary: 3 years have passed. After the death of his father Stiles spirals into uncontrollable drug abuse. Homeless and nearly dead he is rescued by the pack who abandoned him all those years ago. What they pull from that building is an empty shell that has given up on life already. Deep inside though, Stiles always had that spark of life, and it isn't gone yet. (rape/drugs/suicide/slash)
1. Chapter 1

**Hey gays-I mean guys! It's bro-inski here. Back from the dead after a few years of mucking up my clusterfuck of a life. It's been fun and all, and I've done some great drugs and screwed some fantastic people-man and woman alike, I'm an equal opportunities kinda girl after all- on my three year long hiatus. I'd like to say I read a million and two books and wrote awesome stories while I was gone but really I read about thirty books, sat on my ass and said woe me for a while.**

 **Why the new pen name? Everyone is my bro, all of you, all of me, the person outside my window making a ruckus. Really, let's be honest. I love everyone. Also I smoked a lot of weed. Weed is good. Do weed.**

 **Don't smoke weed. If not for your brain, do it for your wallet.**

 **I spent my last dollar yesterday buying expired cookies at my college vending machine. I'm a broke woman who got a perfect score on her HiSET writing test. Going to brag about that for all eternity folks. I had twenty dollars before that but I own three parrots and four cats so I had to buy bird and cat toys and the twenty before that on a piece of coral because I need to look at pretty things like my reef aquarium or I feel homicidal.**

 **I was voted most likely to be a serial killer for a reason.**

 **I'm so stressed I haven't slept more than an hour at a time in two weeks so this is what my brain cranked out. I like this story actually. Lots of sexytimes later on ;)**

 **Warning: There will be dub-con and non-con. God knows I've been abused to many times to actually write a healthy sex scene but I'll try. (I tell my problems to strangers so I don't have to tell my therapist) I'll be honest about that up front, my dub-con looks like regular sex to me.**

 **Please excuse me. I try.**

 **So yeah, bad touch sex. Not by Derek. Let's be honest, Derek is probably a teddy bear inside. But there will be rape scenes later on, mostly references to past non-con though. Self-harm, suicidal ideology, big time drug abuse. Derek probably spoons, maybe he's the little spoon even.**

 **Ignore my babbling, on with the Stiles hurting, I mean sad Stiles, I mean-you know what, fuck it. Just read my story.**

He hated winter. In the summer, the blistering heat made his vision wonky and his stomach roll threateningly with every breath but in the winter the roof would creak and curve further down with every snowfall and remind them that their home was temporary. Already three worn tarps were nailed over a gaping hole the size of a compact car that was lined with shattered wood beams and dangling shingles. Only the desperate came within five feet of the hole. The regulars knew that when the wind blew hard enough the shattered wood would start to splinter off and drop down on anyone sleeping beneath the tarps. Then again, enough heroin in your system and you stopped caring what happened to your body anymore. Stiles knew that personally, a lesson hammered into him from nights he had wandered off in a daze or just sat down and shot up and woken to the beating of fist or shoes on all the soft parts of his body.

This winter was the worst though by far. His body ached fiercely and endlessly. Every round of pain tapered off to bring another round back again. It was a never ending cycle of hurt that he had become well accustom to. The furthest corner from the original door of the house-not one of the dozen punched out of the wall and covered up with flea infested and stained blankets held to the inside wall with rusted nails hammered in with rocks- had become his semi-sanctuary over the past week between pathetic highs that got progressively weaker as his body was overcome with sickness. He was sure someone had slept beside him two days ago, the time guessed by the shine of light on the wall beside him and the suffocating darkness. He remembered listening to the sounds of the floor creaking under the man and the groans as he thrust in his hand. His stomach still turned at the phantom slip-slid sound of his dick moving through his hand and the drawn out groan as he reached completion. He was sure if he turned over the floor would still be stained, the only proof that anyone had come within a few feet of him in close to a week. His body ached and his body creaked when he moved though and the thought of using what little energy he had left to turn over and see the evidence of his visitor was a pointless one.

All he could feel was the cold touch of air against his exposed lips, the only part of him exposed to the elements. The rest of his skeletal body was hidden under layers of moldy blankets and jackets pilfered from the dumpster behind the thrift store. A used needle had rolled in front of his face, visible out of the tiny corner open for him to see through. The orange cap lay less than a foot away beside the burnt up aluminum foil crisp that smelt faintly of ashes and metal. A bloody smear marked the tip of the needle, the only sign that the needle belonged to him and wasn't one of hundreds that probably littered the condemned building. His hands had shook like leaves in the wind when he had pressed the tip into his skin after a few tried and pushed the plunger down to inject ice into his veins. He had amused himself for a few minutes the other day trying to push the needle away with his breath but he'd broken into a coughing fit that ended in dribbles of vomit and mucus trailing from the side of his mouth. After that he'd slept fitfully, time only marked by the time between his nightmares.

He must have been asleep because someone was shaking his shoulder, making loud and frightful noises that grated on his eardrums and gave fuel to the headache that had lay dormant behind his ears. It roared to life and consumed his thoughts faster than an inferno, he opened his mouth to moan weakly. The sound was little more than a puff of air escaping parched lips. The world brightened to a reddish glow behind his closed lids and he feebly turned his head to the side to try to block out the light.

His bones gave an impressive creak as the world spun sickeningly around him. He clenched his eyes as tight as he could and wished himself awake. There was no red shoes, no witches and tornadoes and tiny dogs named To-actually he wasn't quite sure what the dog's name had been but his mind filed it away as irrelevant in the blink of an eye. There were arms under his body and someone was yelling even louder, filling up all the little gaps in his head where the boredom had settled over like a blanket while he lay wasting away.

"-fuck'n Bones, safe'st place, I swear over me momma's grave, ain't no harm come to th' boy-" Oscar, with his tobacco rough voice raised up to a pitch that seemed improbable in any other circumstance. Not that he was all that sure what the circumstances were at the moment. His head was cloudy and riddled with pain and his body was wracked in violent shivers. His body was being rearranged, arms moving to press him into a hard surface that radiated warmth like a furnace. He turned his head into the warmth, uncaring of what it might be and pressed his nose into it as forcefully as he could manage given his weaken state.

People were talking again, someone crying in heart-wrenching sobs and other mumbling. It only registered minimally as he was being moved. Heavy boots crunched glass under him and the noise forced his face to crunch up miserably in a grimace. Someone was worming one big hand into his blanket and jacket burrito and pressing the blissfully warm appendage against his chest. His shivering picked up intensity and his stomach muscles cramped trying to control it. Pain took a back seat to curiosity and he cracked open an eye just enough to see the stormy face of the man carrying him. Red glinted just beyond the icy eyes when they caught the winter sun and fear crawled up his spine. This was it for him, he was sure of it.

Sometimes people disappeared. No one ever said anything for there was nothing to say. There never was. Why would there be? Each and every one of them was on their own, struggling for survival or dying for release. He'd seen a little slip of a girl, barely fourteen, forced to her knees and choked to death in a gruesome display of sexual torture while he hid beside a dumpster riding out his high. He'd witnessed boys gang up on smaller fish and beat them under the only color left was red. There was nothing to it. The strong survived and the weak-well, they didn't. Not for long. Maybe he had been strong once, but it was only a memory. Like the memories of his father sitting at the kitchen table looking over case files with a glass of whiskey after a long night or long nights marathoning video games with bags of candy with Scott. Memories meant nothing anymore, they were wisp that danced before his eyes when life became to much for him.

The hand on his chest was spread out, pinprick pain at each fingertip. The breath rattled in his chest when he breathed but the hand gave it some semblance of warmth instead of the icy chill that he normally dragged through his body with each breath. Those eyes were looking down at him, settled and empty like the calm before a storm. His lips parted, skin tearing along his chapped and frozen lips. A drop of warm blood rose to the surface, proof that there was still warmth inside of him. He wasn't sure why he'd opened his mouth. He'd wanted to say something, but what had been worth saying escaped him. He gave up trying to reach for words and closed his mouth.

He risked a glance down at the arm the emerged from under his blanket wrap and followed it up to a boy whose face was pinched up in an unnameable emotion and brown eyes that were focused on him rather than where he was going. He noticed him looking and offered him a tight lipped smile that came off as a grimace, it didn't reach his eyes which were still dull with pain. His hand twitched where it was pressed to his skin, forming an anchor that held him to the waking world when he wanted so badly to sink back into oblivion and giving him enough strength to observe what was happening.

There were people around him, which he didn't like. People meant pain, people meant rejection. He would rather be alone by choice than alone by exclusion. A woman behind them who looked so achingly familiar. He racked his brain, trying to fight the foggy cloud that had settled over it months ago and never lifted. He had lost so many memories, so many faces from his life before. It hadn't mattered at the time as those memories just gave him heartbreak and reminded him of who he had been and the life he had lived before he lost it all. He'd give all he had right now for a name for the faces that surrounded him and the arms that carried him down the rotting front steps.

He tucked his chin into the collar of his jacket and watched the woman behind them flounce down the stairs as though she was walking a red carpet rather than trailing a drug addict out of a crack house. Her lips were ruby red and glossy in the crisp winter sun and her high-heeled boots crunched through the wet snow on the stairs and thumped on the rotting wood steps. Someone had already put their foot through the third step and she delicately side stepped it without breaking her stride while the man holding him and stepped over it. The hand pressed to his chest was pulled back and he moaned piteously at the loss of heat. All that left his mouth was a cracked sound of pain. The man who had his hand on his chest looked guilty and moved out of sight of him. The arms under him shifted and he rolled closer to the chest in front of him, which he didn't mind as it was still radiating more warmth than he had felt in the weeks since the first snow fall of winter.

The man holding him sniffed and his nose twitched. He looked down at him and drew his eyebrows together. Oh boy were those some eyebrows. Thick and fluffy and more expressionate than the man's face seemed capable of being, they twisted and shifted over green-blue eyes and added to the gruff, unfriendly exterior he had going on.

"You stink." He told him pointedly. The man who had walked beside them came back into view suddenly, his mouth hanging open. He looked stupid for a moment.

"You can't tell him that! What the hell-Derek. Derek!" The man holding him, Derek, picked up speed. His strides lengthened and he pulled away for the man and woman following them. He tilted his hand back and saw they were approaching a car. Car porn, seriously. Sleek, black and distinctively fast looking. There was a thin metal slim jim stuck in one of the windows, abandoned when they had approached. What a sight they must make. A puppyish looking man hovering to one side of a hulk like adonis carrying a skeleton wrapped in filthy blankets and a goddess trailing behind looking like a queen.

A regular motley crew alright.

Derek reached the car and growled deep in his chest when he saw the slim jim hanging out the car window. The growl reverted through him and vibrated under his head where it was rest on his pec over his heart. He liked his heartbeat, steady and calm through the strange event currently taking place. He knew he should be scared, he knew it. For someone like him, this almost certainly meant pain or death.

But death was creeping closer every day and pain was a way of life by now. He was warmer than he had been and he didn't hurt nearly as much. He was curious for the first time in a long while, thoughts niggling at the back of his brain, trying to fight through the fog in his head.

Who were these people?

Why were they so familiar?

The woman reached forward with one perfectly manicured hand and slid the slim jim out of the window, casting a glance at his face while she did. Her lips pursed and she pulled back. The slim jim clattered to the ground at her feet. The car door opened with a beep and he was shifted around so he could be slid inside where it was blissfully warm.

His shivers reach a peak as his limbs started coming back to life. His fingers and toes prickled with the start of pins and needles where they were curled into the blankets. He was pushed aside so the woman could sit down beside him. The door shut for a moment, locking the wind out and leaving him in a strange silence cut only by the woman's calm breaths and his own piercing whistle. His chest rattled sometimes and coughs racked his body and shook his frame at night but it hardly bothered him anymore. The silence was broken by the other two men get in the car. Derek slid into the drivers seat and the other slumped in the passengers, craning his head until his neck creaked to cast worried glances behind him.

"How's he holding up?"

"Fine, he's shivering. Can't you see?" The woman beside him snapped. Her voice wasn't as sweet as the rest of her, rather sharp as a whip and full of biting words. "Be a sweetheart, do something helpful for once and turn on the heater. Low, let's try not to toast him, yes?" Her voice had changed suddenly, going honey think and syrupy. She scared him the most out of the three of them, her sweet tone inciting a feeling of terror. It had the same effect on the man. He jerked as though he had been hit and surged forward to twist the heater on full blast.

"You're an idiot, Scott." She snapped and reached forward to lower it. The man flushed and hung his head, turning away from them to look out the window. Derek stayed silent and his face gave away nothing as he switched gears and started pulling away from the hellhole.

His head flopped to the side and his temple smacked against the window and left a smear of dirt across the pristine glass. He hopes it's dirt, unlike the stinking substance he knows is crusted to his body and clothes and leaving awful painful sores on his skin he is finally starting to feel again. He ignores it and watches the world whip by. It feels like a bad high. Out of control and overwhelming. He's still not sure what is happening to him but his skin itches for the first time in the two days since he has shot up last. He wishes he was still freezing cold and huddled on the ground again, he didn't have the craving then. The need was so far away in the face of his rapidly fading mortality.

His breath catches painfully in his chest. It hits him than how close he was to dying, how close he still is. He'd considered suicide before, of course he had. It was certainly better than what he was doing with his life now. It had been a while though and he hadn't really considered this. That he might just fade away, no pain or fear involved. No messy suicide.

He hadn't even needed to procure a gun even. It would have been the easiest way to go. He had to go, what he was doing wasn't living, it was procrastinating death until he had enough of a backbone to hurl himself over the edge of the nearest cliff.

The scenery is changing outside the window, the only indication that he's losing time again. He does that alot now. There are days he doesn't remember living. Days he isn't even sure that he did live, maybe he just blinked out of existence for a few hours. It's hard to imagine his body walking around doing things without him in it. The warmth has settled into his skin and the pins and needles are fading. He sends signals down to his fingers urging them to move. They don't. He feels disconnected from the rest of his body and wonders if he'd become paralyzed. He sees the reflection of the woman beside him in the window. She's watching him with narrow, critical eyes that make him feel like he's being stripped naked in front of him, stripped right down to the bone. He wants to ask why she's watching him like that, like he holds all the answers in the world but he remembers that he's become paralyzed and his mouth doesn't work like it use to.

He wants to scratch his nose. There is a horseshoe ring flipped into it and it's ice cold inside him. He doesn't know when he'd gotten it but he'd been high enough that it had taken days to come down and stay sober long enough to realize that there was metal stuck through his face. He had shrugged and moved on, unbothered by it until pus ran down his face and sat bitter and putrid at his lips.

He had soaked his nose in cheap vodka for a while, an experience he would bend over backwards not to have to repeat again and thanked whatever deity was hanging around when the pus stopped and his nose healed enough to stop putting burning alcohol up his nose. It had probably dripped back and fried his brain.

That'd be his luck.

"Stiles, we're almost there." He rolls his head against the glass until he can see her out of the corner of his eye. He knows who Stiles is. That is who use to live in this body, when it still housed a person worthy of living in this world. Stiles was the brave mostly stupid boy who fought alongside werewolves, consulted with witches, and faced down death with a defiant grin. That isn't him, he's nobody. He doesn't tell anyone who use to live in this body. That name was someone worth being and he isn't even worth the oxygen he breathes. He doesn't know how she knows it and he doesn't like that she calls him that. He wants to move and grab her by the shoulders, yell at her as loud as he can that he's not Stiles. Stiles was good. But his mouth doesn't move, his fingers don't move. He's living in a corpse, he's sure of it. He died and got trapped and now they're gonna put him in the ground and maggots are gonna eat his body and he's gonna sit there stuck inside his empty bones for all eternity.

He means to meet her eyes. Try to convey the truth to her so she doesn't believe the lie but time skips again and the car is pulling up to a big house surrounded by forest. Sections of it are charred and the mentally conjured scent of smoke drifts through the air and chokes him up when the car door opens.

Derek's eyes look down at him and cut right through him like knifes and he wants to flinch away but Derek is leaning down and scooping him up into strong arms again. He whines a bit, finally capable of sound again when the frigid air hits the exposed skin of his face. He feels a brief flicker of annoyance because he was comfortable, goddammit. And now he's cold and being carried towards the house where he can see curious eyes staring out of a few windows.

They reach the door in what feels like a millisecond and he starts freaking out and twisting as much as he can in Derek's arms, which in his current state is admittedly not much. Derek's arms tighten while Scott jiggles the key in the lock. Its jammed. He can hear it clicking, tumblers refusing to fall into place. The cold can jam locks can't it? He thinks so. Either way he takes it as an opportunity to try and tear himself away. Derek isn't having any of it though and he growls threateningly and tightens his grip hard enough he swear he hears his bones creak in protest.

This is it, these people are totally gonna take him inside and carve him into little bitty pieces.

He doesn't particularly want to ever be in more than one piece. People come in one piece, the end. The lock finally clicks and Scott swings it open.

A blast of warm air hits him in the face like he just stuck his head in the oven and he cringes back from it. There are to many people in the room and he feels suffocated. There is a couple on the couch, the girl curled up into the curve of his body like they are trying to meld into one person. There is a lone woman on the other end of the couch, looking anxious and uncomfortable. Across from her is a curly haired boy with glass cutting cheekbones who has gotten caught in the middle of giving anxious couch girl the stink eye. He immediately doesn't like him. Cheekbones seems to be an asshole, but not as much so as the man sprawled across an armchair with his chin at an angle like he owns the fucking place.

Everyone zeros in on him in a second. Not even twitching when the terrifying woman from the car slams the door behind them and passes them to perch on the arm on the chair the mega asshole is sprawled in. Douchbag. He wilts under the attention. He's not a fan of attention, it ends with him getting mugged in an alley with his pants around his ankles wondering what the fuck just hit him. Scott notices his discomfort and whines pathetically beside him. Derek's eyes cut over to him. And there's the growl again. Scott backs off at the clear warning and collapses in on himself beside cheekbones, who turns to nuzzle his face against Scott's shoulder. He's surprised he didn't leave a trail of blood on his shoulder from running those cheekbones against skin.

He should think nicer things of these people. He still doesn't want to be murdered. Maybe if he says nice things about them they'll just beat him up a bit and toss him back outside.

He licks his lips and looks up at Derek, who shows no inclination to put him down anytime soon. Everyone is looking at him, waiting for some kind of signal maybe. The anxious couch girl shifts and clears her throat.

"Stiles-" She starts but Derek cuts her off sharply.

"Don't. He needs a bath. Then sleep." The girl visibly deflates. He feels bad for a moment, he knows what it's like to be cut out of something. But then he remembers, probably gonna be murdered by her, and doesn't really feel that bad for her anymore. Derek's words sink in after a moment. Maybe he needs a bath and clothes for some kind of ritual. They're gonna sacrifice him to their satanic gods. He groans. He doesn't want to be sacrificed. There's always sharp, scary looking knifes involved with sacrificing people.

Derek is carrying him away from all the people, down a hallways that is cut almost clean in have by fire damage. On the left side in burnt up rooms with tarps stapled over caved in ceilings and walls and on the right is clear signs of fresh renovations. The walls are painted, the windows are clear and holy mother of- yes that is a bathtub he is being carried towards. A big tub, set halfway in the floor and big enough to hold two people comfortably.

Derek carried him into the bathroom and sets him down gently leaning against the side of the tub. The impact is soft and silent, but still jars his body that has been curled up on the floor for to long to handle all the motion he's being forced to go through today. Derek disappears from view for a moment and comes back when he has the tabs running behind him and a thick and ridiculously fluffy towel set down beside them on the floor.

He reaches for his face, rough hands pulling his chin free of the blankets and tilting his face up to meet his eyes dead on. He swallows hard, unsure under the scrutiny of Derek's gaze. He doesn't say anything, but the feeling that he knows Derek and everyone in this house triples. He's sure of it, their faces swim in and out of his head. Flashes of thoughts and memories just out of reach.

"It's going to be alright now." His attention snaps back. Derek's eyes are hard and determined, his face set in concrete. "You're with pack now, Stiles. It only gets better from here." And for one heartbreaking moment, he almost believes that's true.


	2. Chapter 2

**So Stiles is waking up a little, more of his sarcastic self is showing through in the way he thinks. Not my best work for sure but I seriously just wrote 3,000 worlds on a bath. Now, I'm known for taking three hour showers but this is just ridiculous.**

 **At a little over three thousand words this chapter is a little shorter than the last but the next chapter is going to make up for it. Promise )**

 **It's going to be a very slow burning romance I'm afraid. Very rocky and dark in the beginning. I hate sudden love.**

 **I hope you guys get a better idea of what Stiles has been going through the last few years in this chapter. There is Lydia love and Derek trying to help. The next chapter isn't going to feature these lovely characters though I'm afraid. Sorry! But every good story needs time to mature, fine wine here guys. More Stiles in the fourth chapter though.**

The bath feels like heaven. The process of getting him inside of it? Not so much.

Derek gives up trying to get a reaction out of him after a few minutes. His motivational speech doesn't have any outwards effect, and only succeeds in breaking Stiles's heart into a million little pieces. He mentally picks them back up and shoves the shattered pieces back into the little hole he's carved out of his chest for them.

Derek huffs and sets about trying to pry the soiled blankets off of his body. Easier said than done. He hasn't moved for over a week to do anything over than shoot up or stuff moldy granola bars down his throat once or twice. He didn't even know granola bars could get moldy. He stares at Derek picking through the mess of blankets assumability trying to find where the top layer began. He finds it and starts pulling and even Stiles's eyes water at the stench that is released when he starts unraveling him. He would feel ashamed and humiliated if he wasn't so busy trying to keep his stomach from wrenching itself free of his body via his esophagus.

Derek isn't having much more luck. His face is scrunched up and tears are starting to roll down his scruffy cheeks. He has one hand clasped over his nose and is breathing shallowly through his mouth. At this point he's pretty sure that Derek is trying to help him, even if he doesn't understand why but that doesn't mean he isn't taking murder off the table. He's positive he knows him, but for all he knows they could be arch nemesis and Derek is luring him into a sense of security before cutting him up. The first blanket comes loose and Derek hurls it as far away from him as he can. It smacks against the opposite walls and slides down to land in a half solid pile on the floor. The woman from the car is standing in the hallway with her nose crinkled up in distaste and her glossy lips pressed tightly together.

"I hope you plan on burning those." She says, and flips her hair over her should. It's strawberry blond and falls over said should in silky curls that mesmerize him. He's helplessly ensnared by her, caught in her orbit already and he suddenly feels like a young teenager watching his crush walk by him, again. It's to specific a feeling to be random and it catches him off-guard for a moment.

"Lydia, you're not helping." Derek snarls. He makes the mistake of baring his teeth at her. He has to remove his hand from his nose to do so and his face turns the color of oatmeal and he gags. He watches him try to control his breath for a minute before he decides it's as good a time as any to zone out.

"Of course not, I just got this manicure. Get Issac or Boyd to help you." She cast a disgusted look around the bathroom, her eyes catching on him for a moment and a strange expression flickering across her face before vanishing. She spun on one heel and he listened to the clip-clip of her heels across the floor as she headed back to the living room. Derek stares off in the direction she left in with his eyes narrowed and his head tilted like he's listening to something before making another attempt to untangle him from the second blanket.

This one goes a little easier, still soft and protected from the elements. He picked it up weeks ago from a dumpster outside the mall, delighted to discover the star wars theme printed on the fleece. It isn't star wars themed anymore. The cheap ink faded away from weeks of being carried around in his dufflebag before it had been stolen and the last week when he'd gone through a phase of giving up again. It happened more and more than he would like to admit. Derek huffs above him and pulls it free from his body, revealing his heavy fur jacket that he had bought at a thrift store half off sale when he'd had an extra five dollars left after visiting his dealer the night before.

It was warm and he loved it. It was-being thrown in the trash pile now. He silently mourned his loyal jacket while Derek's rough hands stripped him out of his shirt by tearing it down the middle. He was cursing above him, laying eyes on the mess of fading bruises and scars that littered his visible ribcage. It had been a long time since he had actually looked at himself, and even long since he had felt anything but resignation. But now he felt shame, humiliated that Derek was witnessing what he had become. Hands were being wrapped around his thin arms, thumbs tracing the mess of track mark, drawing invisible lines between them like constellations. His touch was red hot and burned into him. He clenched his eyes shut and refused to look when Derek let go and started wrestling him out of his ancient jeans that had molded into his body and practically become one with his skin.

He naked and being lifted back into strong arms when someone else enters the bathroom. He glares weakly at Cheekbones who looks back evenly, if a little uncomfortable in his stare. He doesn't say a word though, just leans down to scoop up the pile of filthy clothes while Derek checks the bath temperature. He leans Stiles against his chest for a moment with one hand to dump enough scented bath wash to disinfect a herd of elephants into the water. He sets the bottle back down and slides his arm back under his knees.

"Issac, is the guest bedroom already set up?" Cheekbones glances at Derek and nods. He's holding the pile of rags as far away from himself as possibly, looking as though he wished to be anywhere else in the world. Derek nods and looks down at Stiles, his eyes settling on what Stiles knows is the hard jut of his hipbones, the clear outline of his ribs and cutting edge of every joint and line of his body. "Tell Scott to talk to his mother about nutrition. You meet him at the store to pick up supplies." Issac stares at him uncomprehendingly for a moment. It's all it takes for Derek's face to harden and him to snap "Now!" at him. Issac scrambles away with the pile of clothes clutched in his arms.

Derek finally turns his attention back to him and lowers him into the water. Whatever Stiles's was expecting, it wasn't this. The water, which is probably only lukewarm, feels like being dropped on the surface of the sun. Being warmer than he had been in months gave him the illusion that he was actually warm. He wasn't and the water was a rude awakening. He screams completely hoarse and high pitched and fights the arms holding him in the soapy water. The soap burns like acid in every cut and sore on his body and he curses Derek with every single word he knew and every new and creative one he learned on the streets. His voice is a cracked whisper at most and doesn't have much effect on his tormentor who keeps him submerged despite his thrashing that sends water sloshing over the edge and all over the tiled floor. The tiles looked new and the sealant unfinished, he bitterly hopes that they are ruined now. The water is burning in his eyes and his hair is plastered to his face in thick, soapy dreadlocks.

He hates his dreadlocks. They aren't cool, Rastafarian dreads. If they were he might have thrown in some cheap plastic beads and called it a day but they are just the product of too few bathing opportunities and too few fucks given about his state of hygiene. Thick, frizzy knotted chunks of dead hair matted together with a mix of oil and shit and sprinkled with a healthy dose of dandruff that nearly colors his hair white. Back when he still gave a shit he would cut them off with rusty scissors he kept in his duffel. Less hair meant less ways for perverts to try and choke him to death.

Now one of Derek's huge hands are squeezing the contents of a bottle of shampoo onto his head while the other still holds his body under the water. His limbs are alive with burning pins and needles and he'd less than thrilled about the manhandling but he's tolerating it because Lydia is walking back into the bathroom with a pair of scissors. He has a flash of fear that he's going to be stabbed that is replaced with devote love towards her when she points one finger at the mess of hair that Derek is tugging futile on with a comb and about a gallon of shampoo. His ears are under the foamy water so he doesn't hear what she says very well but he's glad when Derek hauls him into a sitting position and splits the loosest dread in the pack of his head in half so he can section his hair in two. Lydia reaches forward and starts sawing at the dread closest to his face and he prays to his new goddess silently and may confess his undying love to her a few times if the amused curl of her lips is anything to go by.

The first dread comes loose after a minute spent fidgeting as feeling returns to his extremities. The sensation of the tugging on his scalp releasing surprises him. He'd become so use to it that he hadn't even realized the source of the discomfort until it was gone. The next few give more resistance than the first and Lydia swears colorfully as she saws the scissors through them. Wet hair falls down and sticks to his hands that arm sitting over his knees. His knees are drawn up to his chest, placing his spidery hands near his face. His sight is blurry and unfocused, worse everyday he goes without filling his stomach.

He wants to be angry that he is being yanked around and fussed over. He doesn't know what they want from him. Not that he has anything he can give them anyways, even his body is fragile and broken. His fingers are twisted at funny angles and the skin is purple splotched like he soaked them in berry juice. He doesn't know if it is from having his fingers broken or from the blood rushing back into them but it doesn't really matter when it looks like he has dead flesh attached to the ends of his wrist. His fingers twitch and he swallows down his stomach when it rushes up at the sight of his deformed fingers twisting in different directions.

He can't gather any anger though, never mind any sort of resistance. He's relieved deep inside under the numbness he's lived with for so long. He's warm and clean and people are actually giving a shit about him. It's been so long since anyone has even looked at him for longer than it took to decide if he was worth the ten bucks it cost to use him or the effort it would take to kill him.

He wants so badly to ask why but he's to afraid of the answer. They know him and he knows them, but he doesn't remember who they were and how they knew him. There is a lot he doesn't remember now. Someone explained it to him once but he doesn't remember why, he was to consumed by the need to drive away the pain in his head and the itch under his skin with another hit. He regrets not listening now. Maybe there was some way to remember who they were and why they wanted to help him when he was so obviously so far gone.

Lydia cut loose the last dread and ran her hand over his choppy, filthy hair. Hair tumbled out and floated over the surface of the water. His knuckles were covered in a layer of knotty brown hair. He hated it and watched the water lap at the edges of the mess, hoping that it was surge up and wash it away.

It didn't but Derek took his hands and dipped them under the water. The chaos in his head cleared a little when they emerged clean of hair. Lydia was kneeling behind him soaping up a sponge and Derek was scrubbing soaped up hands through what remained of his hair. Soap dribbled down from his hairline and trailed through his eyebrow before hitting his eye. He clenched his eyes shut to late to stop the burning. Derek's hands felt amazing on his head, loosening up the dead skin and separating his hair. His headache was easing ever so slightly and the pins and needles in his body were finally ebbing away. He moaned piteously against his will when Lydia started methodically dragging the sponge over his body. The fibers felt like sandpaper as they ripped up scabs and scrubbed against tender bruises and open sores. Her hands didn't ease up in the slightest, instead pressing harder and focusing on caked blood and pus and open sores. The bath water was darkening around him to a sickening black-brown. Derek reached in and yanked up the plug. The water was turned back on, sending clean hot water swirling through the dark water around his body. He found the strength in his hands to push feebly against Lydia's hands where they were scrubbing at a particularly agonizing sore on the inside of his thigh. She was slowly working her way up his legs and he pushed harder at her Hans when she reached under the water and gripped his penis in a tight no-nonsense hold and began working her sponge over it. He cried out when she pulled at the sores around his head from sitting it wetness. He couldn't look at her, couldn't see the pity on her face when her hand paused above an old scar of deep teeth imprints on the side of his penis. He couldn't think of the lesson he learned the night he received that scar without breaking down. His body trembled helplessly and her hand jerked back into motion. She finished quickly and moved back.

Derek's hand cupped his forehead while he poured buckets of water over his head. Filthy water cascaded down his body from his scalp with each bucket full that hit his body. He poured until the water ran clear and Stiles had stopped trembling in the face of his pure exhaustion.

It had been weeks since he had been awake for more than an hour or two. Being awake and active again was taking it toll on him and he was compliant and baby weak against the wall of the tub. He dimly noted the water had been shut off and Lydia had rinsed him off with the same efficiency and thoroughness that she had washed him with.

His head lolled back while his muscles melted into liquid. Derek was cutting his beard down close to his jaw. He must have put conditioner in it at some point because his fingers slid through easily when he was finished trimming it down to his satisfaction. His eyes were closed and his mind drifting off into unconscious when he was finally lifted out of the emptying tub of black water and pressed into the sinfully soft towel that had been laid out earlier.

He drifted in and out while he was fussed over and dried off. Lydia was messing with the sores on his legs, smearing something freezing cold onto them that had the consistency of paste and the smell of chemicals and overpowering mint. He groaned when Derek pressed a bottle to his lips while she wrapped dry fabric tightly around his thighs and secured them before starting on the sores on his hands and feet.

He gulped down the water without hesitation, much to tired to question or consider what was in the bottle. The liquid rushed down his parched throat and filled the empty hole carved out of his stomach from hunger. It sloshed heavily in his stomach when Derek pulled the bottle away from him and set it down on the tiles beside him. He turned his face to look down at Lydia who was messing with his feet but the warm pull of sleep was taking him and his head fell back against the bath rug he was half laying on. The world winked out above him, the white ceiling and warm yellow light dimming to black in seconds.

The last thing he saw was Derek's heavy boots beside him before he drifted away.

 **AHHH! Stiles sadness. This chapter was just to give you an idea of the condition Stiles's life has put him in. It's been a hard one unfortunately and Stiles isn't quite sure why he is being help when he's only been hurt for so long. Things are going to get better for him! It's going to be a long, difficult journey for everyone though. No sudden recovery for anyone :(**


	3. Chapter 3

**I am on a roll! Woo! Serious writing spree going on here. I got a billion and one tabs open on drug research and I am so fucked if anyone opens my laptop because I got some crazy shit going on there. Haha.**

 **Anyways, this chapter is a little different, don't expect to get to many from other peoples point of view, there will be a few here and there though just to fill in the gaps of the story where they are needed.**

 **I promise Issac isn't really a jerk, he's just scared that Stiles is going to get between him and his boo. It was fun writing as him, he's kinda snarky. I'd get along well with him what with me being fluent in snarkese.**

 **Anyhow, thank you for the love, so many favorites and followers. I feel so loved guys! Keep it up and I'll keep the updates coming.**

Issac is really trying not to panic.

It's really hard because-one, he hadn't really been all that enthusiastic about getting Stilinski back to begin with and two, he hadn't really expected that Stilinski would even need help. Sure, he may have played apart in helping drive him out of the pack three years ago when they unanimously agreed that it would be too dangerous for him to stay if he was going to remain human. Okay. So he definitely played a part, no use sugar coating the truth.

Scott and him did everything they could to make sure that Stilinski knew he wasn't welcome any longer. Scott did it out of love for his childhood friend, thinking that he had made the right decision in cutting him out if it was going to save his life. Issac thinks he imagined Stilinski off in another town, maybe sheriff even fighting for the greater good like he always did, with a wife and kids living the white picket fence life. Issac wasn't so convinced, he'd been pretty sure Stilinski batted for the same team first of all and he couldn't imagine him playing by the rules somewhere else. Take werewolves out of the equation and he'd probably get in the middle of a gang war or something. Not that Issac had pointed that out. He hadn't been his biggest fan, and the lose of the big mouthed human hadn't really seemed like a big deal. What was a big deal was Scott's reaction to losing his best friend.

Issac had a plan. It was a good plan too. Get rid of Stiles and be Scott's should to cry on once he was gone. Nothing personal against Stilinski, but Issac just hadn't had a lot of chances to get an in with Scott. So he'd settle himself in the best friend position, ready to be a shoulder to cry on as Scott helped bully Stilinski out of the pack. He just hadn't expected so much crying to involved. And wailing, sobbing, accusing, and confessions. He could have done without the knowledge of Scott and Stilinski jerking off to clown porn together in the seventh grade. There were some things in a friendship that are sacred, and secrets like that one was one of them. So yeah, a lot of actual crying and snot on his best scarves was involved.

It actually took a long time to find an opening to pull out of the friend zone and into the man love zone. Stilinski was still living in Beacon Hills at the time, still shooting betrayed looks at them whenever he ran into a pack member. Issac almost felt bad when he and Derek saw him in the supermarket about a month before the shit hit the fan. He'd been coming out of the bathroom when he caught sight of them and one threatening look from Derek had sent him scuttling back in. It had sucked cashing out when he could hear him sobbing in the bathroom like he was dying.

Two weeks before hell came to town Issac had finally broken through the friend zone and landed himself a comfy position in the boyfriend slot. Sure Scott was still really upset, but that would pass. And really, everyone understood that Stilinski was better off without them. Even Scott, as much as it pained him to admit. Issac spent more of the first six months of their relationship comforting Scott than actually dating him. It was worth it in the end though or Issac might have put his head through a wall in frustration.

Issac had only been in his new spot as boyfriend for two weeks when it all went to shit. Like a lot of shit, hitting a very big fan. No one knew there was a rogue omega hanging around, waiting for the chance to strike when the pack finally turned its back.

It had targeted the Sheriff. Probably hoping to cause chaos and confusion while it set down roots in Beacon Hills. Whatever the intention had been didn't matter because only four hours after the vicious attack that had ended in John Stilinski being brutally murdered and his seventeen year old son tortured in the basement the pack had hunted him down and torn him to pieces. If Issac remembered correctly, the biggest piece had been small enough to fit in a ring box.

It didn't undo what had already been done though. Stilinski stayed in the ICU for more than two months before child services relocated him to a city a few hours away with a more advanced intensive care unit for him to recover in. Scott drove there at least twice a week for the first month to stand under his window in the hospital and whimper piteously before security had him banned from the premise and Derek made strict orders against Scott heading back out to see him. The last thing they needed was some nasty following Scott up to see Stilinski and murdering him in his bed like the omega wolf had done his father.

Issac had been sure that in all this time he would have recovered. Picked up the pieces of his life and move on. Sure, he wasn't under the illusion that he was going to go like the American dream but he hadn't seen him dying in a drug house either. He knew Stilinski hadn't been straight-laced just as well as the rest of the pack did. While he may have been successful in hiding it from his dad, the sheriff, he wasn't so successful hiding the scent of pot from the pack of werewolves that made regular trips to his room. In fact, Issac knew for a fact Scott and Allison had broken into his stash once and screwed like bunnies on his batman sheets after getting Allison stoned stupid for hours and Scott buzzed for five minutes.

It had been a good laugh at the expense of Scott's dignity.

So Issac had thought that maybe Stilinski was off doing his thing at some community college. Maybe getting a degree in something stupid, like art. Which is why he didn't take the tip from the next pack over seriously. He didn't even know how knew he had been involved with the pack, never mind what he was up to. So when Derek came back to the house they had worked so hard renovating and turning into a home wearing his angry face #4 with the heavy brows pulled together and his mouth yanked into a thin white line of 'don't fuck with me' Issac had been fairly unconcerned despite the worry of the rest of the pack.

So what if Stilinski was messing around with drugs? The guy had lived and hard life and it had only been three years ago that he lost everything. He was allowed to be upset still, Issac still was sometimes about his own father and the man had made a habit of locking him in a deep freezer. He thought, 'wasting away in a crack house' was a bit of an exaggeration.

But apparently it wasn't because now him and Scott are pulling into the Walmart parking lot with a list of nutrition shakes and vitamins courteous of Melissa McCall. Not to mention the dead thing that Derek carried into the house about an hour earlier. Issac uses the term 'dead thing' lightly. It's practically a compliment to the shaking skeleton swaddled in shit-stained rags that Derek had been holding. He would have never believed it was Stilinski if he hadn't walked into the bathroom to get the rags on Lydia's orders, which gross, he wouldn't have normally done but Lydia was giving him murder eyes from her perch on Jackson's lap. He'd seen the dead brown eyes that he still remembered as being full of life and laughter, the matted hair and knotty beard he was hiding his face behind and the peek of moles he remembered dotted his skin.

The feeling in his gut was oddly reminiscent of being punched in the stomach. He'd grabbed the rags in his shock and smeared something that smelled like year old tuna fish across his best vegan leather jacket. He silently promised to change Lydia for the dry cleaning on it and made his escape a second after Derek lost his cool and yelled at him.

He glanced over at the driver's seat where Scott was sitting with both hands clutching the wheel hard enough that hairline cracks were radiating out along the plastic. He considers convincing Scott to let go before he has to replace the steering wheel again but decides that Scott needs to get himself under control more.

His boyfriend's face is a funny color, ranging from old oatmeal to the wicked witch of the west. It would be impressive under any normal circumstances but now even Issac doesn't know whats going on in his head. Scott is an open book, displaying his emotions to the world like they were going out of style and to see him closed off and struggle hurts more than seeing the half-dead person in the bathroom that he is partly responsible for.

He sits quietly for a long time and watches the couple parked in front of them load up their car with a weeks worth of groceries. The man has bought an industrial sized bottle of lube, which reminds Issac that he really needs to-no actually, something tells him he's not going to be getting laid for a long time after this. The last thing on Scott's mind is going to be sex and as much as that thought bums him out he decides he can live with that if it means Scott can deal with the guilt he has from driving away his best friend.

The couple gets in the car and drives away, which leaves him with nothing to do but memorize the contents of the shopping list he has been given while Scott gets his head together enough to go in the store and not have a total meltdown or wolf out. It's a pretty straightforward list, even if some of it seems strange.

Like wet wipes.

Or adult diapers.

If Stilinski is going to wear diapers than Issac is going to avoid him like the plague. He won't change a grown man's diaper for anything short of a million dollars. Melissa had said that in his condition, as malnourished and weak as he is, he probably won't be able to get to and from the bathroom. He'd already figured that out from the mess Stilinski had made of the rags he'd been wrapped in. A little part of him hopes that Allison has to do it. He'll admit he hasn't forgiven her for trying to kill Scott on multiple occasions, never mind that it happened years ago. He's okay with that, he'll never be a forgiving sort of guy anyways.

Scott is making little choking sounds next to him and it kind of makes him want to turn the radio on even though it hurts his ears to listen to the background static just because he doesn't want to listen to his boyfriend work himself up into a full blown melt down in the Walmart parking lot. He's pretty sure Scott would make him sleep on the couch for at least a month if he did that though so he puts his hands in his lap and try to play the role of the supporting boyfriend.

"I'm fine. Let's just get this stuff and go." Scott tells him with only a slight hitch in his breath when he says it. The fact that he started his sentence with 'I'm fine' proves that he's not but Issac knows when to keep his mouth shut so he rolls up his window and gets out of the car before Scott decides to take another half hour break. He grabs the cart with the least amount of used tissues inside and starts towards the entrance with Scott trailing pathetically behind him with the saddest puppy dog eyes Issac has ever seen him use.

The walmart greeter just beside the door gets growled at because any distractions could mean the difference between getting through this shopping trip in one go or having to go back to the car for another break/meltdown and Issac is so done with this day already. He just wants to get in and out at this point. Scott offers the greeter a sad smile in apology for his insane boyfriend's behavior. He can't even find it in him to care he wants to get out of here so badly.

The health section is right next to the door so he pick up eye drops first. For Lydia, because she promised to hurt him if he forgot. He picks up all in one vitamins from the next aisle and pre-natals on a whim just so he can imply to Lydia that she might be such a bitch lately for a reason. He knows it's not true, she's always that scary but he has a plan to throw Jackson under the bus for the vitamin purchase.

Next is the protein and meal bars which Scott spends ten minutes browsing through because even though Issac is okay with buying the first first one he sees(Carrot and butternut squash blend) Scott is a bit pickier. He switches out the boxes four times before hes satisfied with the peanut butter chocolate and the coconut caramel bars he got. The shakes are a lot easier because Issac grabbed vanilla shakes while Scott was trying to repair his irrevocably ruined friendship with protein bars.

He grabs the diapers from the next aisle as well and stuffs them under the cart because he has the feeling Scott will jump to Stilinski's defense if he sees them. And no, just no. Because Issac saw that mess in the bathroom, and he's not cleaning Stilinski's bodily functions. So yes, he gets the diapers while Scott isn't paying attention. He internally compromises and doesn't buy the ones with flowers on them like he was originally going to because Scott is eventually going to see them and realize Issac bought them and he doesn't want to get yelled at.

Scott settles on the protein bars while Issac picks up wet wipes with ducks printed on the box and the strongest body wash he can find. He thinks about the dreaded hair on Stilinski and hopes Derek cut it off or at least has plans to because he doesn't think there is strong enough conditioner in the world to untangle his hair. Maybe they could slick it up with lube and brush it out that way. It's an entertaining thought.

He gets that fancy water with the electrolytes in it because he figures it couldn't hurt even though it isn't on the list and Scott takes it as a sign of actually caring and beams at him. Issac feels like a jerk because he still doesn't care all that much.

He actually manages to get the rest of the stuff in record time. He even buys Scott a new video game out of his own money and assures him that if Stilinki gets his shit together they can have a video game marathon. Then, because he's such a jerk, he tells Scott that they should probably hold off on the clown porn until later.

Yeah, he's never getting laid again. Ever.

He picks up eggs and eggnog, which is always his favorite thing about the holidays and leaves Scott to pick out juice while he goes through the rest of the aisles. He gets the stuffed burgers that Erica and Boyd like and swiss rolls because Jackson has a massive weakness for them and Lydia yells at him about his weight every time he eats an entire box in one sitting.

Scott catches up to him as he's checking out with a jug of sugary juice in each hand and a Popsicle mold under his arm. Issac is to happy to be leaving to say anything about it so he lets Scott "subtly" slip it into the cart under Jackson's swiss rolls.

The cashier stares at them weird while she scans their diapers and vanilla shakes so Scott feeds her a heart warming story about his grandfather moving in with them which Issac ruins by informing her the bacon flavored lube was out of stock. It actually makes Scott smile a little so it's fine that she double charges them for the vitamins she was holding when he made the remark because Scott's pleased little smiles are practically what Issac lives for.

He tries not to bowl over the door greeter in his enthusiasm to get the hell out of there. He gets the evil eye from an old Russian lady sitting on a bench beside the door which he doesn't really care about except that a Russian witch cursed him once for bumping into her and spilling her rare, virgin menstrual blood down her robes. At least he assumes it was something like that. He really didn't get the chance to find out because he was to busy puking up organs and discovering first hand that werewolves actually can regrow their stomaches. Good memories.

He unloads the cart into the backseat himself because Scott is a lazy bastard who escaped to the front seat to sing sad songs from the eighties with the radio. He even manages to slip the diapers into the seat well without argument so it doesn't really bother him that much that Scott isn't helping. By the time Scott actually starts driving back to the Hale Pack house it's raining and the water is turning the snow to a disgusting slushy mess that most definitely going to turn to ice overnight.

It's quiet for the first ten minutes of the fifteen minute drive back and Issac almost things its going to be one of those rare completely silent car rides. Scott ends up speaking up though, his voice thick will all his unspoken doubts and worries.

"He's going to be fine? Right?" Issac looks at him hard. Scott is driving with absolute focus. His eyes are glued to the slushy road in front of them and his hands are clenched around the cracked steering wheel. The only thing giving away his inner turmoil is the nervous twitch in his jaw from trying not the grind his teeth. He thinks of the broken man on the bathroom floor and decides that Scott really doesn't need his honest opinion on Stilinski's condition.

"Define fine." He says instead in as much of a teasing tone as he can manage. Scott huffs out a laugh and shakes his head, sending his hair flopping around in an adorable sort of way that kind of makes Issac want to kiss the top of his head and cuddle him.

"Do you remember what it was like when he was still here. Still with us?" He's kind of surprised by the question, it isn't one of Scott's usual naive questions. It's simple enough, but Issac has a feeling the answer he's looking for a bit more complicated. He remembers Stilinski well enough, he was a pain in his ass after all. He followed Issac around a lot, tried to convince him that Derek was using him. It didn't matter that it had been true than, Issac had been angry at the cards he was dealt in life back than and was happy to finally belong to something. It didn't matter to him that Derek was a dickwad with more emotional issues going on than anyone he had ever met to this day, or that Erica was on her violent, slutty period and Boyd wasn't bothered enough to put his foot down and stand up to Derek. He belonged to something, and Stilinski wanted him to leave it all behind.

He chooses the stupid answer.

"Yeah. I suppose." Scott doesn't seem surprised by the answer and Issac feels a little annoyed that his boyfriend doesn't expect more from him even if he made the decision not to answer the question fully. The house comes into view finally and he can see Derek pacing across the nearly finished front porch. He looks agitated and as they pull the car into the driveway he can see the frustrated lines in his shoulders.

Issac has always read Derek best. He'll never be to Derek what Scott and Stilinski were to each other, but he can safely say he's the closest thing to a best friend that Derek has. He hops out of the car and leaves Scott to the bags so he can check on Derek.

He's not soaked through yet, so he hasn't been outside very long. He's not punching anything, which is always a good sign. He's relieved to see Derek give him a tight lipped smile when Issac approaches him.

"Was it that bad?" He asked, forgoing niceties like greetings and small talk and getting right to the root of the problem. Derek flinches a little and his face tightens even more.

"Worse" He whispers hoarsely and Issac is glad the rain is to loud for even werewolf hearing because it would kill Scott to hear that. "He-I can't-fuck. How can anyone live like that?" He ask. Its a rhetorical question, if it wasn't Issac would be screwed because he really doesn't have an answer for that. It fine though because Scott is heading towards them with the bags all shoved in his hands and under his arms because he is of the opinion that it's always one trip or die trying and Issac loves him so much for it. Conversation over, which means it's time to face the music already.


	4. Chapter 4

**So I posted a short update on why I haven't posted any new chapters (That being that I started college) and to thank the awesome people who have followed and favorite and even reviewed and I get hate mail. My intention was to assure you guys that yes, an update is on its way and this story is not abandoned.**

 **But according to a guest reviewer, it was to disappoint you with my rant and to post stupid crap. This guest reviewer's intention was apparently to put me in a bad mood when I checked my email on my phone first thing after waking up. I write because I enjoy it, and I enjoy other people's work and want to contribute to my fandom. It takes a lot of time and effort and I would appreciate not being flamed for expressing my gratitude towards my supporters and explain why it has been months since my last update.**

 **On the other hand, thank you again to the people who like my work and thank you to the people who don't, but have the basic manners to exit the page and not read it.**

The sun rose slowly, slanting soft pink-yellow light into the window that overlooked the field that made up the Hale house's backyard. It illuminated the sharp edges of the face that peeked out from under a nest of blankets and cast deep shadows in the hollows of his cheekbones. The boy's eyes were half-open, squinting into the light shining through the window. His eyes glowed the amber of whiskey, shadowed by the long sweep of dark lashes. In his eyes glowed a burning curiosity like embers sparking to life. The light of morning and the warmth of life in his limbs brought clarity to his mind that had not been present the night before.

His thin tattooed fingers were clutching the blankets to his face, they trembled minutely with the anxiety that sank his stomach with the weight of a hundred bricks. He'd been awake since the sun had started rising in the sky. He'd counted the stars as the sky lightened and the sounds of life began outside the small room he was tucked away in. In front of him was a nightstand containing a simple metal lamp and a few tattered books. The floor was unfinished, half the room covered by a pale wood while the other half was still bare concrete covered by a ragged rug that had been worn bare in some places.

He didn't know what was behind him as he was to scared to actually move and look. If he moved he would have to admit that he was awake and the events of the last few hours had actually taken place. If they had then Derek, his Aph-no, he wasn't going to go there with his thoughts. He clenched his eyes shut tightly and clenched his fingers tighter in the blankets until he could imagine the bones creaking under the pressure.

He'd sat nearly comatose while Derek had carried him out of the condemned house bridal style, he'd laid limp and life less while Lydia and Scott fussed over him and later Derek as he was scrubbed clean of the filth he'd hidden behind for so long.

He had lain perfectly compliant and empty-headed while he was stripped down and scrubbed raw in the bathtub. He hadn't uttered a single protest when the heavy deadlocks that had weighed down his scalp were sawed off, leaving him with choppy hair that had been stripped raw from multiple washings.

His hands were still bandaged, crisp white gauze wrapped around the frail joints. The stark black lines of tattoos shown through, as well as the deep blue of the dead rose tattooed into the back of his left hand. He could feel the gauze bound tightly around his raw feet and imagined they looked similar to his hands, save for his right foot, which along with most of his right leg was the largest stretch of tattoo-less skin on his body. He'd offered his body as a canvas for an aspiring tattoo artist a year back, gathering a massive collection of tattoos that covered almost every inch of skin and some amazing highs spent on her thrift store love seat holding her thin hips helplessly while she slid herself up and down him.

It was a good memory, better then most he'd amassed over the years.

Outside the room the floorboards creaked and his eyes snapped open and immediately focused on the shadow under the door. His thoughts flew away from him, as they were often prone to do most days. After a few moments of silence, in which Stiles held perfectly still with baited breath, the shadow shifted and the floorboard creaked again. He heard the distinctive sound of footsteps deliberately exaggerated make their way down the hall.

His breath rushed out of him-and stayed away. He gasped helplessly when he discovered that his throat had closed up in his moment of brief panic. His chest moved in a shadow of breath but none came.

The door flew open and Scott rushed in. His eyes were wide and panicked, desperately scanning the room for a threat that explained the man hunched over in fetal position on the bed gasping like he was dying. There was nothing, just the warm sun illuminating the terrified figure on the bed. His mouth moved frantically, open and closing like a fish out of water and his chest heaved, mimicking breaths he wasn't actually taking. His eyes were rolled back in his head and his body was shaking fiercely while Scott stood helplessly at the door for a few moments of confusion until Issac blew into the room with all the likeness of a tornado.

He pushed Scott aside and made a beeline for the bed where Stiles lay quaking, lips slowly turning blue. He wasted no time freeing the man from his blanket restraints and pulling him into a sitting position with his back to Issac's chest.

Across the room Scott's face was flushed red and his hands clenched and unclenched, the right hand leaving the distinct imprint of fingers in the cheap doorknob.

Issac was rocking Stiles back and forth, making soothing sounds more wolf than man. For a long moment the entire room held its breath, releasing it when the first choked breath passed through Stiles's lips. From there his breath stuttered in and out for what felt like hours, but was less than five minutes, until his lips had returned to their previous pale tone and his body had calmed to a slight quiver. Scott took a hurried step forward, his eyes desperate. He didn't see Issac's head snap around or the last second attempt to warn him back, if he had he might have known to keep his distance. But he hadn't and he crossed the room in three huge steps to bring himself to the edge of the bed.

Stiles snapped, pulling out of Issac's loose grip and throwing himself away from the two men. His eyes flashed dangerously at Scott, who stood with one arm outstretched towards him and his mouth hanging open dumbly.

Issac slid of the bed and stood without so much as a backwards glance at the man staring daggers at his boyfriend. He pulled his scarf tighter around himself and flicked the loose end over his shoulder. Stiles backed up further, leaving him with his back pressed to the wall and as far away as possible from Scott's outstretched hand.

Scott seemed to shake loose of his stupor and dropped his arm. His face was impossibly young, filled with hurt and confusion at the clear reject. Stiles, who had forever had a weakness for Scott's childish demeanor, showed no emotion other than the spark of anger that flashed behind his sunken eyes. His mouth was slightly open, upper lip pulled back in warning. Issac raised an eyebrow but remained removed from the situation. Scott was his, but some mistakes weren't his to prevent. This was one it seemed Scott would have to make if he was to learn anything. He'd already been warned, by Deaton, by Derek and by the majority of the pack that it was more than likely that Stiles would want his space once he'd woken.

Scott though, forever the nurturing type, had obviously not headed the warning in his determination to smother the man he had called his brother back to health. Scott opened his mouth, and closed it when the words didn't seem to come. He did this a few times, searching for words to make this all better while Stiles became visibly more agitated.

"It's alright dude, your safe now." Not bad, Issac supposed Scott could have done worst. Stiles didn't look convinced, particularly when the next words to leave Scott's mouth were, "We're family, we always look out for each other." Issac cringed. Stiles remained silent for all of five long seconds before his pale face colored up and his eyes bugged.

Scott remained sincere, his arms hanging from his sides but his palms facing up in a peaceful gesture. If peaceful intentions were kindling, the fire was spiraling out of control. Stiles skeletal face was quickly going from pink to cherry red, even Scott seemed to know he'd stepped wrong.

'I mean-we haven't. I didn't- I didn't want to make you leave. How could we have known? We can make this better, we can fix-"

Stiles exploded outwards in a flurry of motion. The blankets he'd begun wrapping himself in were thrown from him and his bony limbs moved faster than Scott could realize he'd screwed up. Bandaged fingers wrapped around the column of Scott's throat, deathly white fingers stark against the warm tan of Scott's skin. His face was twisted into a demented expression made all the worse by the flash of cracked canine teeth and the glint of twist metal in his nose. He wore no shirt, only swaths of white bandages around his belly were sores had been meticulously cleaned and carefully bandaged. His chest heaved in anger and his ribs jaunted out, each one painted in thick lines of brilliant color that made his skin seem all the more sickly.

His anger was clear in his eyes now. Even Scott had dropped his childish hopes of getting his best friend back. His flushed face tightened and his jaw shifted as he ground his teeth down. His hands came up to pry Stiles's shaking fingers free from his throat and hold both emaciated wrist in one clawed hand.

"I'm trying to help! I only want-"

"I don't give a flying fuck what you want!" The man screamed, spit flew from his mouth and splattered across Scott's face. The werewolf payed it no mind, Stiles anger was feeding his own and his skin felt super heated as it grew. Stiles's either didn't see the danger or didn't care because he kept going. "You gave up any right you had to my life when you choose your _pack_ over me." The word pack fell from his lips like the word itself was diseased.

"I don't need your help." He growled and started yanking at the hold the werewolf had on his wrist. Issac's eyes snapped from one person to the other, his need to not get more involved then he needed to warring with his need to protect Scott and get him out of the room before he did something he would regret.

"You were going to die! You don't know what you looked like, I thought you were already dead." Scott was quieting down, his anger as short lived as his ability to hold a grudge. Stiles had been a hothead as a teenager though, and the trait hadn't lessened any in the years he'd been gone. He was pulling frantically, turning his hands and much as he could to rake razor sharp nails across Scott's skin. The angry red lines vanished before his nails even left his skin but he was far past caring.

"I didn't need you to come in on your white horse. I handle myself just fine." His voice had lowered to a hiss. He had mostly deflated, only his eyes showed how angry he was.

"Fine? Is that what you call that? You're a fucking mess. You think this is what your father wanted?" Whatever reaction Scott had wanted, he hadn't gotten. The man who had just a second ago been spitting mad seemed to shrink into himself suddenly like a turtle retreating back into its shell. His mouth was pressed into a thin line and whatever life his anger had pumped into his body had drained since now he hung limply from the grip Scott still had on his wrist.

"Don't-" He choked, a dry painful sound in the back of his throat. His tongue flicked out to wet his lips before he tried again. "Don't bring him into this. Just don't." Scott dropped his wrist abruptly and took a step back.

"You want to help me? I'm tired. I just want to sleep." The energy had left his body, leaving him exhausted and hardly able to hold his eyes open. His hands fell limply into his lap and his eyes didn't raise from where they were gazing sightlessly at the floor. Scott shifted forward, looking like he was going to try to salvage the situation. Issac put his foot down though and reached out to pull Scott back.

"Yeah, that's fine. You need the sleep dude." He seemed to want to say something else but his brain had finally caught up with him and he thought better of it and his mouth snapped shut with an audible snap. "Just yell if you need anything, someone will help you." He paused for another moment, eyes burning with regret as he observed the man slowly gathering the blankets around himself again and pulling them over his frail body. He turned on his heel and left the room. The floorboards creaked again. Issac stayed behind a moment longer.

"Sorry." Was all he said, muttered under his breath before he turned on his heel and followed after his boyfriend. The door closed silently behind him and left Stiles alone with only his thoughts.

His limbs trembled with weakness as he shifted himself into a more comfortable position huddled on the bed. His mind was more empty than it had been both the two men had arrived. The conflict had scattered his thoughts like seeds on the mind and left him with only the ache of impending withdrawal to contend with. He could barely feel the pain of hunger in his belly over the worsening ache in his bones and the numb feeling that clouded his mind.

It didn't bother him though. It had been a long time since he had wanted something more than he wanted the high. He wanted something now. He wanted to be free of these people who so ignorantly thought he would slot back into their pack like nothing had happened.

They had abandoned him and left him alone. They had been nowhere to be found when he needed help the most. He'd lain alone in the hospital for months, slowly and painfully recovering from his ordeal while watching hospital bills he couldn't pay quickly stack up. He'd agonized over what he would do over the long nights he lay awake staring at the ceiling of his hospital room listening to the continuous beep of machines all around him.

He'd taken his medication religiously, relishing the numbness and the escape from worry and loneliness they afforded him each time he swallowed them down and when he'd been well enough to leave his bed for more than five minutes at a time he'd snuck into the room where the heavy drugs were kept and loaded his pockets with chemical heaven. Into his bag they went, removed from their bottles and hidden under the bag lining he'd torn lose.

It'd been so easy to fall into addiction when there was nothing left to live for. He hadn't felt shame, or guilt for there was no one left to feel anything for. It hadn't hurt so much when he'd returned home and laid numb and empty in his father's bed, the only place left in the world where he could still fall asleep.

It had hurt a little when the bank representative came and informed him with artificial regret that his father's house was being foreclosed. It had bothered him a little when people started showing up to pester him about hospital payments and when Melissa had swung by and left a slightly burnt casserole and a stack of hospital bills while he lay nearly comatose from a painkiller overdose in the upstairs study.

It had all been fine though, because escape came in a bottle now and sleep took up at least twenty hours of his days most of the time. The other four spent in a haze of getting high and shoving food that tasted like ashes and cardboard down his throat.

His life was okay because for the most part, he didn't have to live it.

When he was forced out onto the street when the bank finally took his house he'd found a wide, empty pipe at an abandoned construction zone and called it home for more than a month as he started dabbling in street drugs.

The only way he could live was to cover his skin in beauty and his mind in cotton.

These people that he had once called family meant nothing anymore. He'd moved so far beyond the life of bravery and heroics that he'd lived by their side that he had no right to call himself Stiles anymore. There was no getting better for him, no recovery at the end of the road. They could try all they liked but the boy they had called Stiles had died in the basement watching his father take his last choking, bloody breaths. The sooner they realized that he no longer existed the better for everyone involved.

Maybe then he'd be able to die in peace.

 **Not my best chapter by far, but I had horrific writers block writing this and rewrote it at least six times. now that this chapter is over with I can move on to the real story!**

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 **Love you guys :)**


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